The whole Gathering staff team broke away from the office for the day today to do one simple thing: remind ourselves what really matters. It’s so essential for ministries and individuals to do this on a regular basis. Carving out time to get away from the routine and get refocused does amazing things in each of our lives. If we’re not careful, the business of life can overwhelm us to the point where we just forget what’s really important.

We focused on five things today that really matter:

People really matter
Prayer really matters
The Scriptures really matter
Ministry environments really matter
Advancing the vision really matters

I loved today – because of the people I was with and because of the things we were talking about!

I’m definitely a big believer in the “never say never” mind set. But I may have found an exception. Twitter.

It’s been coming up in conversation a lot recently and often with a “would you ever think about twittering?” bent to the conversation. I’m honestly curious about your thoughts on this. Not to bias you too much, but here are mine:

1. You lost me at the name. Twitter. Is that from the verb “to twitter”? What were the other options that got rejected? I just don’t think any self-respecting man runs around telling his buddies he’s doing a little twittering over the weekend.

2. I don’t really think any one could possible be that interested in what I’m doing at all times. Trust me, I’m with myself all day long and it just isn’t that interesting.

3. Even if you are interested, I’m not sure I want to tell you. A little amount of privacy can be a good thing.

4. It feeds an incredibly destructive tendency in each of us – the tendency to be so absorbed in the lives of others that we never live our lives. It doesn’t matter whether the others are actors, executives, politicians, musicians or pastors. God wants us most focused on living our own lives for His glory.

Ok, I’ think I’m done. Your turn…

I’m really looking forward to having the whole Gathering staff team over to the house tonight. It should be a great night and I love any excuse to grill out in the summer. It’s so good to be able to get teams together just to be able to relax – no agenda, no pressure, no decisions to be made.

It also reminds me of how grateful I am to serve with this team. I can’t imagine doing all of this with any other group of people. We work really hard but we also have a lot of fun together. That’s one of the great blessings in my life and one of the things I’m incredibly grateful the Lord has given me.

I’ve been in a UMD drought recently. With so many of that campus’ leaders in South Africa earlier this month, vacation schedules and a bunch of other things, I’ve felt really removed from what’s going on over at College Park.

So, it totally made my day running into a couple of UMD’s leaders here in The Gathering offices! So good to reconnect with them personally and so awesome to know that even as I’m writing this, they’re meeting with Okey to plan the fall at College Park!!

Definitely praying for God to do some amazing things at UMD this coming year!!

I was driving home on Monday night thinking it would be a pretty quiet evening. It had been a good day at work but I was definitely looking forward to having the night off and just being able to unwind at the house. Maybe I was a little too excited about all of that; maybe I was anticipating it a bit too much. It’s possible I was going a little fast. Not fast enough to get a ticket, if that’s where you think this is heading! But fast enough that the newly installed speed bumps in my neighborhood gave my car’s shocks a REALLY good workout.

I was not a happy little guy. First of all, can a home owner’s association just install those things on a random Monday without warning? I know the average Northern Virginia home owner’s association makes the government of Myanmar look compassionate…but still. Is there no limit to what they can do? But more importantly, I really think you need to paint those things. I didn’t even see it coming! It honestly wasn’t my fault – I was just minding my own business and then BAM…massive speed bump. Not cool at all.

But life’s a lot like that, isn’t it? You can be sailing along on a perfectly calm day and then all of a sudden, BAM…a massive speed bump. Ever been there? I know I have. The Bible promises it’s going to happen to each one of us. The only question that really matters is what we’re going to do when we hit the speed bumps.

Will we cling to Christ and His promises? Or will we go on spiritual hiatus? Will we allow the trials to bring us closer to God or to drag us away?

I know that doesn’t lessen the shock of the bumps. But, hopefully, it helps us handle them with grace.

Tonight’s Bible studies should be pretty amazing. We’re going to be spending a lot of time dealing with anger in our groups – not anger at each other! But the anger that can plague all of our lives. It’s one of those things that can be absolutely devastating but one of those things we seldom talk about. We’re going to fix that tonight and I think you’re going to love the conversation! So, get to a coffee shop near you tonight!

I’m sitting here in the office realizing it’s one of those amazingly perfect summer days. Ok…my recent trip outside for lunch was really the time when I developed that understanding! But you know what I mean.

Any way, my point is – this is the perfect day for a Nats game. Good news! The Gathering is headed down to the new stadium tonight. If you’re free, you should join us. You can get all the information on Facebook.

Taking in a baseball game or two is definitely part of enjoying summer!

We’re trying something new over the summer just for our volunteers and coaches. The Gathering is offering a little “summer school.” Our volunteers and coaches are always serving students but never get to enjoy being students. So, we’re turning the tables. We’re offering three sessions this summer just for our coaches and volunteers. We’re going to be exploring some tricky theological questions over the summer:

- Calvinism vs. Armenianism
- Eschatology (End Times Stuff)
- Gifts of the Holy Spirit (tongues, healing, etc…)

Should be really interesting. I’m definitely looking forward to our first session on Sunday afternoon.

This past weekend was a serious recruiting push for The Gathering. We were asking non-students to come alongside our team by either leading a small group or coaching a ministry team at any of our campuses. If you were around MBC this weekend, you heard about both what God is doing through The Gathering and how you could be a part of it. In case you missed it though, I wanted to extend the invitation to you over the blog. If you want more information or are interested in serving us with, email Josh. He loves emails and really likes connecting volunteers!

I’m running downstairs to the Edge here at MBC in just a few minutes. But I thought I would do a quick post to break these past 48 hours of cyber silence.

I spent all day yesterday working around the house – staining the deck and other fun things like that. It was actually really good – good to be outside, good to be getting things done and good to feel like summer’s really here. For some reason, I felt like I missed out on the first three weeks of summer. Not ever sure why – but I definitely feel like I’m making up for lost time!

The weather this weekend is amazing. I’m in the office all day today – but I hope you’re able to get outside and enjoy summer!!

If ministries are a lot like families then it should make sense that our offices are a little bit like our homes. Yeah, that means they should be comfortable places to work. But it also means they need a little spring cleaning every once in a while. Today was that day for The Gathering. Our whole team rolled up their sleeves and threw a bunch of junk out before reorganizing things around here. I think it’s a great idea and something ministries should do together at least once a year! It’s honestly a lot of fun – our team had a great time.

Now we’re going to cap off the day by having dinner together!

I had the chance to spend a good chunk of time with our future leaders this morning. We were talking about how our finances really are a spiritual issue.

Jesus says something so profound in Matthew 6, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Take a close look at verse 21. “Where your treasure is (present tense), there your heart will be (future tense) also.” God cares so much about our money because it’s one of the primary ways He trains our hearts! Our hearts follow our money. Where you spend today, your heart will move to tomorrow.

That’s so important for each of us to understand!

I can’t wait to be at the Fairfax Bible Study tonight. For some reason, it just seems right. It’s like Wednesday nights at 9PM belong to Gathering703 in my heart. I love the prospect of being right across from campus at Saxby’s.

I’m praying for all our studies tonight. We’re going to be tackling some really difficult verses in James but I think it’s going to be so worth it if we press into the heart of what God is saying in those passages. I honestly feel like this is one of those nights that has the potential to reshape so much of what we think about in terms of our relationship with God.

Hope you’re able to make it to Saxby’s or one of the other locations.

Just so you don’t think all I listen to is Christian music – not saying that would be a bad thing, by the way – I have to say that I’ve nearly worn out Coldplay’s new record since it released yesterday. Definitely not doing a Chris Martin commercial here – but that kid can sing! Definitely worth a little bit of your time.

Plus, Coldplay is still the band that’s made one of my all time favorite videos. Just thought you might enjoy:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRUkGDGbJpk&hl=en]

You might remember that in the end of May, we sent a short term missions trip of students from the University of Maryland to South Africa. By all accounts, it was an absolutely amazing time. I wanted to share with you the words of one of the staff members from Thrive Africa, the organization they served alongside for nearly two weeks. Here’s how he described the students from The Gathering.

“The one thing I valued most was the fact that they’ve gotten to a place that few others have, and even fewer at their age. Their lives have no boundaries; they haven’t compartmentalized their life to the point where the world and God never intermingles. In fact, God is in every aspect, but not overbearingly. It’s not like they came with something to prove; they just live in a way that reflects Him, that screams His name loudly with every breath, but is so unimposing at the same time.

In them I saw a promising future; something I haven’t been able to wrap my mind around for a long time. Even though the Church is constantly growing and that means that there should be even more people for the mission field, we’re plagued daily by reports of how poorly our youth are growing up. We’ve seen growth in missions, but nothing like the growth in our modern world. But they proved, in a week and a half, that young people do have the potential to change this world. Not only do they have potential, but they are drastically changing the world already.”

Wow. It’s such an honor to serve Christ with each one of you!